WIRED reports on another ATM manufacturer that printed the default master passwords to their ATM machines directly in their user manuals. Future Crime readers will recall that I previously reported on a similar issue with the Tranax ATM.

Of course the ATM users could change these passwords, but since the machine does not require them to do so, many simply don’t. As is so often the case, good security starts with common sense, thinking about the problem from the user’s perspective, and a little bit of thoughful design. It seems Triton could use some help in this area.

Bruce Schneier reports today on a great future crime story in which the culprit uses an unchanged administrative password to reprogram an ATM to think it holds $5 bills instead of $20 bills. There are a couple of interesting aspects to this story. First the attack exploits a well known security flaw which remains an unbelievably common practice in a variety of settings: failing to change default passwords. Second, the attack doesn’t require the system to be altered, but rather uses the correct operation of the system (the Tranax Mini-Bank 1500 series) as part of the attack.

Another interesting aspect of this story is that it illustrates the tension between competitive business practices and security. Tranax has been trying to use innovative business practices to become more competitive in the ATM business, and these very practices may have enabled or aided this attack. This article from ATM Marketplace describes how Tranax is trying to make it as easy to order an ATM as it is to get a laptop from Dell. In fact a quick visit to the Tranax support pages, tells you that the default passwords can be found in the printed manual which you can also order directly from their site. I note that although its probably a little harder today to get your hands on a Tranax manual, any legitimate owner of a machine has one. And therefore any legitimate owner or employee with access to a manual could easily try this exploit on any Tranax 1500 machine regardless of who owned that machine.

Finally, the role surveillance played in discovering the exploit is interesting. While the culprit might have disguised himself and used a nearly untraceable prepaid ATM card to access the machine, the exploit might have gone undiscovered for a long time without the surveillance video showing how it was accomplished.